LECCE, DIOCESI di. — Suffragan of Otranto; the city of L. is also the provincial capital in the Salentine peninsula. It is the heir of the ancient Iapygian city of Lupiae; politically and ecclesiastically dependent on Byzantium until the Norman conquest, it eventually became part of the Kingdom of Naples.
The Cathedral is dedicated to the Assumption. It currently has 164,000 inhabitants, of whom 163,000 are Catholics, distributed among 39 parishes served by 180 diocesan priests and 90 religious priests; 10 male and 50 female religious communities; 2 male and 3 female educational institutions; and 36 charitable institutions.
HISTORY. — Criticism has demolished the arguments of the ancient historians concerning the first hypothetical bishops of this diocese. L. (Aletium-Lupiae-Lycia) may nevertheless claim the ancient origin of its episcopal see, since among the bishops who subscribed to Pope Vigilius’s Constitutum on the Three Chapters (553) there appears a certain Venantius, bishop of L. At the end of the same century the see was vacant, as appears from a letter of Gregory the Great (596), who ordered Pietro, bishop of Otranto, to supervise the nomination of a successor, in order possibly to consecrate him in Rome. This is the only certain information until the end of the tenth century.
Held by the Byzantines, and repeatedly invaded and destroyed by the Saracens, it found peace only with the Norman conquest (1055–71); at that point the name of a bishop reappears: Teodoro Buonsecolo (1057), who endured all the vicissitudes of the twenty-year war between the old and the new rulers. After him, the chronological series is complete. The following are remembered: Formoso (d. 1131), who, with the aid of Count Goffredo, erected the Cathedral (1114), dedicated to the Virgin Assunta; Pietro Guarini (1180–91), who, during the reign of Tancredi, founded the Benedictine abbey of SS. Nicola and Cataldo outside the city; Roberto Volturio or Vultorico (1210–54), who rebuilt the Cathedral from its foundations (1230) and obtained from Innocent IV the investiture of the county of L. (1252); Marco Ziani, son of the doge of Venice and nephew of Tancredi; Luigi D'Aragona (1499), cardinal deacon and son of Ferrante I, king of Naples; Braccio Martello, transferred from Fiesole (1552), who took part in the Council of Trent; and Antonio Pignatelli (1671), archbishop of Larissa, later cardinal and pope under the name of Innocent XII (1691).
MONUMENTS. – The Duomo preserves nothing of its original structure, after G. Zimbalo (1661–82) rebuilt it in that Baroque style which is the most characteristic mark of Salentine art. The bell tower is also due to the same artist; and to him, together with Gabriele Riccardo and Cesare Penna, belong the various Baroque alterations and the enormous profusion of decoration (1549–1695) of the basilica of S. Croce, built in 1353 by Gualtieri VI di Brienne, duke of Athens. Also richly Baroque are the former convent of the Celestines, now the prefecture, the Seminary buildings (1694–1709), designed by G. Cino, and the episcopal palace, which still preserves some simple original lines (1420–28). Outside L. stands the celebrated church of SS. Nicola e Cataldo, whose composite Romanesque structure has been taken away by the Baroque only in minimal part: a distinctly transalpine interior, dome and base ornamentation in Eastern and Apulian styles and forms, a principal portal with a triple decorated band, a remarkable conjunction of Arab-Norman art. Finally, singular and still intact is the Basilian church of S. Maria di Cerrate (ca. 13th century), rich in sculptures and frescoes.